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MEMBER DIARY

A Questionnaire for Candidates & Incumbents

No Dodging These Issues

Each election, candidates are scrutinized from a variety of directions and on an even wider variety of issues. Two issues that shouldn’t be debated, though, are the First Amendment and our nation’s prosperity. With that in mind, every candidate or incumbent nationwide should answer some questions on those subjects. Let’s get to the questions:

Do you support reviving the Fairness Doctrine? If you do, explain why? If you don’t, why not? Please keep your answers as precise and on point as possible.

If you support the Fairness Doctrine, outline with specificity how it could be implemented. Also, explain what impact it would have on the radio industry.

To House candidates:

Do you support Rep. Michael Capuano’s proposal to make it mandatory that representatives get prior approval to post work-related content on blogs, YouTube and other websites containing advertising on them? If you support it, why do you support it? If you don’t, why don’t you?

To all candidates and incumbents:

Does McCain-Feingold need to be reformed? If yes, which specific portions of it need reforming? If it doesn’t need reform, why doesn’t it?

Has McCain-Feingold been a success? If it has, what successes can you cite that happened directly because of McCain-Feingold? If it hasn’t been a success, why wasn’t it successful?

If McCain-Feingold wasn’t successful, were its shortcomings forseeable?

Does McCain-Feingold limit free speech? If it doesn’t, explain why it doesn’t.

As for prosperity, let’s ask the candidates this:

1) What specific steps would you take to curb inflation?

2) Can you curb inflation without dropping the price of oil? If you think you can, explain how that’s possible. If you think you can’t, explain how you’d lower the price of a gallon of gasoline.

3) Can you lower gas prices without exploration in areas that are currently offlimits? If you can, explain how that’s possible.

4) If you think you can’t lower prices without expanding exploration in areas currently offlimits, would you support opening up new areas for exploration?

5) Are marginal tax rates an important component to national prosperity? If they aren’t, why aren’t they? If they are, explain what role they play in fostering prosperity.

Candidates should be willing to answer each of these questions. Any reticence on their behalf to answer these questions specifically should be seen as their attempt to hide their unpopular opinions. This should tell us where candidates stand on two of the most important issues of this election cycle.